Inherited Values
by DictionaryWrites
Summary: Draco Malfoy's son has an unexpected encounter in the Ministry of Magic, and Draco is suitably surprised.
"Father?" Scorpius asks quietly; he is an intelligent young boy, Draco has discovered as he's grown taller and become more and more curious, and he does his best to be as affectionate as he can manage.

It's important, after all, so important to him that Scorpius feels loved. And he does, of course – Draco and Astoria dote upon him even as they teach him one spell or another, even as they tutor him, teach him to do one thing or another. His mother, of course, is a wonderful grandmother as well, and she will put so much affection upon Scorpius one might think the child would explode with it.

"Yes, Scorpius?" Draco asks as they move into the Ministry, and Scorpius walks beside him, given that Draco has adjusted his gait to allow for it. Scorpius is quiet for a moment, looking positively pensive, and Draco frowns – it's not an expression he really appreciates seeing on the face of a ten-year-old.

"Why is it that Grandfather does not wish to meet me?" Draco stops short, pausing, and he gestures for Scorpius to follow him to a side corridor, where he moves to sit on one of the benches outside of a file clerk's office.

Draco considers the truth – that he has said to his father hundreds of times, by letter, by Floo, in conversation with him, and that each time his father had refused to meet Scorpius without giving any reason at all.

He also considers what his mother had told him when Scorpuis was three – that his father had given her, when she'd asked why he'd not deign to meet his own grandson, a very simple reason. That he did not want to ruin the child.

It's a bizarre thing to think of, given how strict the man had been with Draco himself, given how sharp he could be, how strict, how easily angered, that he considers Draco ruined. Draco had tried, of course, in his youth, tried his best, but his father's standards had been particularly high, and with the war-

Draco sighs softly, and he reaches up to rub slightly at his own face before he moves to quite carefully grasp for his son's hand, squeezing it for a moment before he says, "I don't know." Scorpius presses his lips together – he does not look upset, not really. He doesn't seem like he might cry.

He merely seems quietly unhappy, and Draco wishes he could fix it, wishes he could somehow convince his father to meet Draco's – so it feels to him, now he's held this child in his arms, and raised him – main reason for living. "I don't know, Scorpius, but I can tell you that if he did meet you, if he wasn't such an obnoxious, stubborn old man that he'd refuse, he would be as proud of you as I am."

Lucius had never told Draco he was proud of him – not once, in all of Draco's memories, and he does his best to ensure Scorpius knows that Draco is proud of him.

Scorpius smiles a little, and although that unhappiness remains at his eyes, he seems more relaxed. "Now, I'll be back directly – I need to see one fellow for just a moment, and then we'll head into Diagon Alley, alright?" Scorpius nods, and Draco quickly slips down the corridor.

It's a simple enough meeting – things at the Ministry are different these days, and the politics are different to how Draco was instructed in his youth, but even with things becoming more liberal, Draco is not sure that's so terrible.

He's learning to adjust, after all, in some ways if not in others.

His speech done with, he slips out of the room, and in the corridor he stops short, stepping immediately to the side to be slightly out of sight.

"The incantation is chromatis allagao." Draco's father murmurs, and he demonstrates with a quick flicker of his wand; his shoelaces turn a bright yellow, and Scorpius laughs a little, giving a nod of his head. "Now, take my wand, and give it a try yourself."

"Are you quite sure, sir?"

"Of course; you're a fine young lad. Shan't break it, shall you?"

"No, sir." Scorpius says, and Draco watches as he takes his grandfather's wand in hand, and on the first try he turns his own shoes a bright purple, obnoxious purple. He laughs, and he neatly returns the length of elm – a new wand that his father had gotten, after the war, but of a very different length. "Thank you – that's a really good spell."

"I'm sure you'll be a very talented young student when you attend school." Draco's father turns his head, and he sees Draco, at which point he moves to stand. "I shall see you, child. Return to your father."

Lucius then moves rather rapidly down the corridor, and Draco looks after him, lips pressed together, hand clenched at his side.

"Father?" Scorpius says, and Draco turns to look at him, eyebrows raised. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine, Scorpius, really. What did he say to you?"

"Oh, he just showed me this charm, to change something's colour?" The first charm Lucius had ever taught Draco, but he had never been so- so fond. He had smiled in the same way, if Draco recalls, had smiled with the same initial tenderness, but then he had become harsher, firmer, insisting Draco ought practice when he could not perform the spell immediately. "He said he was a friend of yours. Who is he, Father?"

"Oh, he is not important, I assure you." Draco says, and he moves to pat Scorpius' shoulder. "I knew him when I was a child."

"He was nice." Scorpius says, and Draco looks at him for a few moments, his mouth suddenly dry, his tongue suddenly very heavy.

"Yes, yes." Draco says, and he quickly gets Scorpius to come from the Ministry with him, out and to Diagon Alley. He thinks of it as they walk in the direction of the Leaky Cauldron – his father will teach his grandson charms, affect him with more praise than he ever had in Draco's childhood, and yet he won't allow the both of them to be introduced.

Draco regards Scorpius for a moment or two, and he had supposed, on one level, that it was best his father never meet his son, lest he might indeed ruin him. Astoria is of that opinion, anyway, and yet, and yet-

"Father? Can we play with the snitch tonight?" Draco remembers flying on a broom beside his father, how proud the man had looked the first time Draco had caught the snitch himself, though once Draco left his broom he had quite sternly said he might have caught it faster with better concentration.

"Yes, Scorpius." Draco replies, and he does not share the thought, because sharing talk of his father always felt like rubbing it in, when he'd refuse to meet Scorpius himself. "Yes, of course we can."


End file.
